Synchronizing 2 machines: Avoiding double downloading

  • Thread starter Thread starter R
  • Start date Start date
R

R

I just converted from Outlook Express to Outlook 2002. I want to keep my
home & work machines synchronized, and I don't want to download email twice
from the POP3 server. (But I want to keep the message on the server for a
few days in case anything crashes.)

I plan to copy the *.pst files to a flash drive & take that back & forth
with me between home & work, backing up & restoring as appropriate.

My question is how to prevent Outlook from downloading messages a second
time. OE would do this correctly (sometimes!). Is there a way to get
Outlook to do this?
 
R said:
I plan to copy the *.pst files to a flash drive & take that back &
forth with me between home & work, backing up & restoring as
appropriate.
Click to expand...

An aside: backing up and restoring how? Why not just point your profile at
the flash drive PST? If you'd rather have the PST on your hard drive, make
sure you simply COPY the PST with Outlook closed and that you don't
overwrite a PST that a mail profile references. No special [procedure for
backup and restore required.
My question is how to prevent Outlook from downloading messages a
second time. OE would do this correctly (sometimes!). Is there a
way to get Outlook to do this?
Click to expand...

Outlook obtains a value, called a UIDL, from the POP server for each
message. It caches them and when asked to download, compares the UIDLs it
has with those the server reports. If they match, Outlook doesn't download
the message again. This is exactly how Outlook Express does it, too. You
should not be getting duplicates of messages already downloaded unless
something is messing up the UIDL cache.
 
Brian Tillman said:
R said:
I plan to copy the *.pst files to a flash drive & take that back &
forth with me between home & work, backing up & restoring as
appropriate.
Click to expand...

An aside: backing up and restoring how? Why not just point your profile
at the flash drive PST? If you'd rather have the PST on your hard drive,
make sure you simply COPY the PST with Outlook closed and that you don't
overwrite a PST that a mail profile references. No special [procedure for
backup and restore required.
Click to expand...

I don't trust the flash drive to be stable/robust enough to use as a working
drive; I just use it as transport between the machines. And I agree, I do
all copying after I close Outlook. For many years, I've used a little
program called SecondCopy - http://www.centered.com/ - that does a good job
for this. It won't overwrite newer files, and it will also make scheduled
backups to another place on the hard drive. Once set up, it needs almost no
attention from me, & the backup/restore between home & work only takes a
minute or two at each end. There are probably other similar programs out
there, but this one works for me. (I also sometimes use a program called
Beyond Compare - http://www.scootersoftware.com/ - if I need to look
carefully at directories before copying.)
Outlook obtains a value, called a UIDL, from the POP server for each
message. It caches them and when asked to download, compares the UIDLs it
has with those the server reports. If they match, Outlook doesn't
download the message again. This is exactly how Outlook Express does it,
too. You should not be getting duplicates of messages already downloaded
unless something is messing up the UIDL cache.
Click to expand...

I assumed there must be something like this. (I understand the principle,
but not the guts of how a thing like that works!) Does the UIDL reside in
one of the PST files (which one?) so that I can include that PST in my
backup/restore between machines? I don't like to try to backup/restore
things from the registry because I'm always afraid it might be
machine-specific, & I might cause myself real headaches.
 
R said:
I assumed there must be something like this. (I understand the
principle, but not the guts of how a thing like that works!) Does
the UIDL reside in one of the PST files (which one?) so that I can
include that PST in my backup/restore between machines?
Click to expand...

To tell the truth, I don't know where Outlook keeps this cache. Perhaps
someone else does. It it's hidden in the PST, it would go a long way toward
explaining what you see.
 
Thanks for the info.

Looking back, I realized that it was you who gave me the most help a year
ago when I posted a question about migrating from OE to Outlook. (I wanted
to put messages in year-folders, each with their own PSTs because otherwise,
if it was all stored in one Outlook.pst, it grew to be over 300MB - not
nice.) It took me a year to find the time to do it(!), but your advice was
the one that worked. I transferred 95% of my old folders/messages, but on a
couple folders it choked half way through & left half the messages
untransferred. I tried moving the messages to another OE folder to
transfer, but no luck. I'll try a couple more ideas & then leave as is. If
I need to search for an old email, it's still complete in OE. If you have
another idea on this one, I'd love to hear it. Otherwise, many thanks for
this much!
 
R said:
Looking back, I realized that it was you who gave me the most help a
year ago when I posted a question about migrating from OE to Outlook.
(I wanted to put messages in year-folders, each with their own PSTs
because otherwise, if it was all stored in one Outlook.pst, it grew
to be over 300MB - not nice.) It took me a year to find the time to
do it(!), but your advice was the one that worked. I transferred 95%
of my old folders/messages, but on a couple folders it choked half
way through & left half the messages untransferred. I tried moving
the messages to another OE folder to transfer, but no luck. I'll try
a couple more ideas & then leave as is. If I need to search for an
old email, it's still complete in OE. If you have another idea on
this one, I'd love to hear it. Otherwise, many thanks for this much!
Click to expand...

Try isolating it to a specific message. move half the messages to a new
folder in OE and try to export that folder. If it works, the problem is in
the other folder and you can keep subdividing it intil you find out where
the problem is. If it doesn't work, transfer the original folder, which
will probably work, since the problem is in the new folder. Once the
messages are on Outlook, you can sort them there for your best use. When
you get down to the message that won't move, you can decide then if you want
to keep it. You may have to leave it in OE.
 
Thanks so much. This is more or less the strategy I had in mind, but your
approach is a little more systematic, which is good. I'll try it ... sooner
or later! Many thanks.
 
[I'm continuing this from another thread: Synchronizing 2 machines: Avoiding
double downloading]

I'm still trying to get my work & home machines synched, and so far it's
working well, with one exception. As far as I can see, I'm synching all my
email, contacts, etc, by copying the PST files & carrying them back & forth
between machines on a flash drive.

But when the newly synched machine goes to download my email, it downloads
everything from the server, i.e., it double downloads. Brian Tillman
(below) mentioned the UIDL, which keeps track of which emails have been
downloaded, which would prevent this problem. But copying the PST files
apparently doesn't carry the UIDL with them.

I don't want to touch the windows registry, but I noticed 2 other file
locations that Outlook seems to update and wanted to know if it's safe to
try to synch those files, too, in case they contain UIDL information, and/or
things like views, etc. (Basically, I'd like as much of the same work
environment as I can manage.)

I'm currently synching the PST files in:
C:\Documents and Settings\[me]\Local Settings\Application
Data\Microsoft\Outlook

Can I safely synch additional files in:
C:\Documents and Settings\[me]\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook
(files: Junk Senders.txt, outcmd.dat, Outlook.FAV, Outlook.NK2, Outlook.srs,
OutlPrnt, VIEWS.DAT)
and in:
C:\Documents and Settings\[me]\Application Data\Microsoft\Office
(files: Excel10.pip, fbc1B87.tmp, Imagin10.pip, MSO1031.acl, MSO1033.acl,
MSO1051.acl, MSOut10.pip, PowerP10.pip, Recent, VB10.pip, Word10.pip,
Wordma10.pip)

Might some of these be relevant and safe to copy back & forth (synch), &
help with my double downloading?
 
R said:
I'm still trying to get my work & home machines synched, and so far
it's working well, with one exception. As far as I can see, I'm
synching all my email, contacts, etc, by copying the PST files &
carrying them back & forth between machines on a flash drive.

But when the newly synched machine goes to download my email, it
downloads everything from the server, i.e., it double downloads. Brian
Tillman (below) mentioned the UIDL, which keeps track of which
emails have been downloaded, which would prevent this problem. But
copying the PST files apparently doesn't carry the UIDL with them.

I don't want to touch the windows registry, but I noticed 2 other file
locations that Outlook seems to update and wanted to know if it's
safe to try to synch those files, too, in case they contain UIDL
information, and/or things like views, etc. (Basically, I'd like as
much of the same work environment as I can manage.)

I'm currently synching the PST files in:
C:\Documents and Settings\[me]\Local Settings\Application
Data\Microsoft\Outlook

Can I safely synch additional files in:
C:\Documents and Settings\[me]\Application Data\Microsoft\Outlook
(files: Junk Senders.txt, outcmd.dat, Outlook.FAV, Outlook.NK2,
Outlook.srs, OutlPrnt, VIEWS.DAT)
Click to expand...

The FAV, NK2, and SRS file names must match the name of your mail profile.
If it's "Outlook" on one machine (which it obviously is on the machine
above) and "Me" on the other, than on the second machine, the files should
be named Me.fav, Me.nk2, and Me.srs. The outcmd.dat file controls the
appearance of your toolbars and shortcuts. The Junk Senders.txt (and Adult
Senders.txt) are used by Outlook's Organize feature in screening your
incoming mail. I don't know what Views.dat does. See if
http://www.slipstick.com/config/backup.htm helps.
and in:
C:\Documents and Settings\[me]\Application Data\Microsoft\Office
(files: Excel10.pip, fbc1B87.tmp, Imagin10.pip, MSO1031.acl,
MSO1033.acl, MSO1051.acl, MSOut10.pip, PowerP10.pip, Recent,
VB10.pip, Word10.pip, Wordma10.pip)
Click to expand...

I don't know what these files do and I certainly have never had them in any
Outlook installation.
 
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